


Peep Show.  1/1.

by punky_96



Category: The Devil Wears Prada (2006)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-02
Updated: 2018-05-02
Packaged: 2019-05-01 01:05:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14509146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/punky_96/pseuds/punky_96
Summary: Re-post from LJ.Pairing: femmeslash, well, I’m not gonna say, but there’s a dancer, a bookkeeper with dreads, a red head that screams, a mechanic ex-boyfriend and a mysterious lover on the other side of the glass...Summary: AU. A California peep show dancer tries to make her way in the world juggling broken dreams, hopes that revealed different realities, and the possibility of love.





	Peep Show.  1/1.

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: Um, the medicine referred to here is sex not drugs. Sex: it’s just what the doctor ordered.
> 
> A/N 1: I don’t actually know anything about peep shows or sexy time dancers so hopefully my muse did a good job plucking this from the ether. Who knows where the hell she gets this stuff?! I mean I do watch tv and film... and went to a club once a longgggg time ago. lol
> 
> A/N 2: song “Glory Box” by Portishead

**_Peep Show_**  
  
The screen went up. The room was dark. It was always dark. Going up meant that it was show time, not that she would get to see who was in the small room watching. This was a people aquarium and she was the pretty little fish on display not the other way around.  
  
At least she didn’t have to hear the coins drop into the slot every few minutes.  
  
Technology.  
  
In the modern age where a gadget could do anything your heart, or sex, desired—people were still engaging in the various businesses that involved paying for a thrill of the flesh.  
  
At least with credit cards, touch screens and automated billing she didn’t have to hear the metal hitting metal as coins were fed into a slot and she danced and touched herself for the faceless viewer.  
  
*** *** ***  
  
When the screen went down she could decide whether or not to take a break. Some nights it was murder to have the light on and a clock prominently displayed. She was selling an illusion, however, with such killjoys as the sterility of the room and the red L.E.D. numbers on the clock it was more difficult some nights than others to not let the mirage of reality waver and disappear. The longer you were on break, the longer you were not making money. Some nights she would work straight through her shift on some kind of full moon fever of projected arousal. Those nights she was always glad that the bookkeeper in the back room knew what she needed and like a prescription she could ‘use as needed.’  
  
On a cold night like tonight she needed to step outside for the shock of it. She needed to feel the cold air burn her heated lungs and to sting against her flushed skin. An enclosed open patio meant that she didn’t have to cover up to step outside in her flimsy ‘uniform.’  
  
Nights like tonight dragged on and on for her. The red L.E.D. lights burned into her retinas until she threw her head back with her eyes closed and hoped that her other movements would make up for her lack of perceived eye contact.  
  
In those moments, she thought her life would have been better if she hadn’t been injured her senior year. Maybe the full ride scholarship would have come through. Her dreams had been simple enough back then and as black and white as the newspaper stories she wanted to write. Questioning the universe, she would let her head fall back against the wall catching and pulling her hair.   
  
Maybe the bookkeeper could show her about the computer.  
  
Squeezing her arms tight around herself, she would think, “She went to college. Not much good it did though. She wanted to be an artist.” A dull dead laugh would escape her lungs and echo in the patio, but it wouldn’t cheer her spirits. “Now she does the books for an ‘adult establishment’.”  
  
Trudging back in, she felt the heat of the inner building like a fog clouding her brain.  
  
On nights like that the bookkeeper had to give her a ‘stronger dose’ of medicine.  
  
When they were spent and gasping for air, the darker skin of her bookkeeper’s fist trapped inside her, the dancer considered their lives again, ‘Well, she has all the girls she could want without putting her goodies out on the shelf. Maybe college did make a difference.’ Recovered and releasing each other they would straighten themselves out. No kissing, just the helpful handing of panties or the brushing of hair back behind the ear. Her shift over, she would slip out the door into the almost hopeful first rays of the morning.  
  
*** *** ***  
  
A year and then another year went by, she could tell by the frost on her car window in the mornings. It made getting home a bitch. The heater would only finally reach kind-of-warm by the time she had arrived at her doorstep. The frost not completely thawed making her drive with the windows down and the cold air complicating her life. It was a huge old car with a mismatched fender, a radio that only played AM sometimes, and cracked vinyl seats that she always had to hope and pray would not snag her miniscule costume.  
  
The air was changing, but other things were too.  
  
The bookkeeper’s mini-dreads had been switched out in favor of longer braids. She wore glasses that made her brown eyes look soulful. Her door was always open for her and closed for others. Routines and patterns were settling around her like a layer of winter snow on the mountaintops. They would have to talk soon. She knew but pretended not to. She just wanted to get through her shift.  
  
Leaves fell along with some raindrops. ‘Thought it didn’t rain in California.’ She would glare at the sky.  
  
‘Some of the regulars must have gotten new cars,’ she noticed with a pang of jealousy.  
  
Then she caught herself. Maybe some of the regulars had changed.  
  
The past few nights the shift had started out slow enough with the screen lifted a few times as a short timer (as they were called in the biz) watched her and clocked out. Those were easy for her to shrug off. They were so excited by the experience of coming to a forbidden place, making a request, and paying for it that they got off in no time. It was more about them than it was about her. She could do that all day. The second half of the shifts had been the ‘new development’ as it were.  
  
The screen had gone up and then just stayed up. Until dawn the screen stayed up. No break, no rest, no clue.  
  
She had shrugged off the bookkeeper as she stumbled out into a cloud of sweet perfume.  
  
It wasn’t every night, just like the slow cooling of fall. A night here or there like that was followed by several of what could be deemed ‘normal’ activity. As the weeks passed there were more and more nights of just that one person on the other side of the screen letting the credit card roll as the red L.E.D. numbers flashed by till morning.  
  
Having found that she could change up her routine with a loyal patron she began to stare into the glass, lick her lips, play with her hair, roll around and just be sexy instead of full body dancing and touching herself. There were long moments where she would just lay looking into the glass wishing that it was a specific person on the other side that cared and letting her hand reach out to touch the glass.  
  
The first night she did that the screen went down.  
  
It was a strange game. She could never really know if her loyal patron had come into the room or if it even was the same person each time monopolizing her viewing. Yet it was as if a relationship was forming despite the 3 inches of glass and 3 feet of darkness.  
  
Other changes happened too. Each month a new batch of residents moved in and out on the tidal flow of rent.  
  
Her upstairs neighbor was a sexy screamer. Instead of seeking medicine from the bookkeeper, she was giving it for all she was worth when she returned from work in the early morning. The building had a new wakeup call and she loved it. No strings were attached to that red head—she had too many irons in the fire running around for her boss. It was a pattern that wasn’t a pattern, like wearing red and green for Christmas, but knowing you only had to do it for a while. Who was to say how long her fire would last? She could avoid the soulful looks of the bookkeeper another night, another shift. She could go home, shower, and then slink upstairs to pull some hair, wind her up for some really good screams and then send her over the edge with unrelenting thrusts of her long fingers hitting the right spot.  
  
The day her car didn’t work the red head picked her up in the morning. The lusty good morning kiss and subsequent pawing in the parking lot was fueled by seeing what her lover did for a living and how blissfully sexed out she looked. The amazingly slutty outfit and work-messed make-up may have added fuel to the fire as well.  
  
The bookkeeper caught her on the way in to work the next day. A single tear slid down her bronze cheek.  
  
*** *** ***  
  
The screen went up. She had only been working for an hour, but she dared to hope that it was her patron. ‘Hope.’ She cough-laughed, ‘I live on it.’ She rose to her knees and began a kind of dance that resembled a cobra writhing while it waited for the snake charmer to look away so it could strike. She bit her lip as she rolled her hips. Then she arched back lowering herself to the surface of the mini-stage. Her sex barely covered tonight by a g-string, she was completely open. Letting her legs slip around to the front, she bent her knees up and rose into a sitting position. Her elbows were on her knees as she stared down the glass.  
  
Many long moments passed as she let her eyes linger with desire at the window. Her stillness increasing the tension as she waited for the screen to go down, or enough time to go by for her to believe it was her patron.  
  
A short timer would have already had what they wanted. She let a slow breath out and smiled as she ran her hand down the side of her face leaning against her own touch.  
  
Anyone else would be scared of the intensity of her gaze as she sat spread so open and sexually challenging.  
  
The screen did not go down.  
  
She let her hand trail down the side of her neck. Her fingertips just brushed against her smooth pink lips before slowly circling her hardened nipple. The tension left her body even as her heart beat faster. Remembering other nights when she felt this wild, the brunette breathed deep knowing it must be a full moon again. The way her body was singing, she knew that the red head was in for it at the end of this shift. The thought made her sex clench.  
  
Letting her eyes flutter shut, she smiled a sexy knowing smile as she prepared to engage her lover for the night. She could not pinpoint the exact moment that the shift had occurred, but somewhere down the line, she began thinking of this patron as her lover. It was inexplicable, but the excitement that flooded her body each time she ascertained that person was the one on the other side of the glass was undeniable. With her eyes, her hands, her body, and her mind, she made love to this person on the other side of the glass by loving on herself. Doing to her what those hands would do if there weren’t 3 inches of glass between them. If only the lights were low, the shiny tile was a comfortable bed, and the red L.E.D. clock would never flip to the next number. Alternately gentle and rough hands would caress and manipulate her body any way they wanted until she could place her hands on the lover’s body.  
  
She lost herself in the fantasy, knowing the person on the other side of the glass went on the journey with her. Nothing could keep them apart. Time spent in intimacy like that could not be bought, despite the gargantuan credit card bill that no doubt was being racked up. Some part of her dared to hope that money was no object. Maybe it was the hot shot of Monaco or the only survivor of a recently deceased steel baron. Much as she didn’t want to admit it, something else had crept into these meetings, anonymous though they were. ‘No strings’ seemed to pull at her heartstrings.  
  
She turned away from the glass and flexed her back, arching her breasts toward phantom hands that reached around from behind her. They squeezed and rolled her nipples gently at first and then with more and more pressure until they were pulling on them. The metal of her piercing throbbed between the pleasure and the pain of it. She longed for the mouth of her lover on her—the hot moisture of a tongue licking the metal and swirling it around. She loved having the hoop sucked between fevered pink lips and then gently tugged with teeth. Rolling her back, she moaned into the silent room and the echo sounded like it came from her phantom lover. She lifted her hair and ran her hands down the sides of her body as she let it drop in a mess. Lying down, her head hung off the front of the stage giving her lover the view of the length of her body. Her hands roamed where the phantom hands wanted to. Her pussy walls clenched as she wondered if her lover had to stand up to look at her face, or if it was enough to just watch her body.  
  
She teased herself until her whole body was trembling, but she did not cross over into the brink. Instead she made a show of sitting up and facing the glass once again. Crossing her legs in front of her, she slowly licked her juices from her fingers. Long licks up her palm became the slow sucking off of her fingertips. Leaning closer to the glass, she tilted her head so her eyes gazed up into the glass.  
  
The lights went out plunging the building into total darkness and silence.  
  
Grabbing her legs tightly against her chest, she fought the urge to squeal. It was a reflex action, instead of a full-fledged fear. The lights would be back on soon enough. If they weren’t it wasn’t like the layout was hard to figure out. She could find the door and the way out easily enough. Finding her keys and other things would be the challenge.  
  
A light filled the other room as a cell phone was powered on.  
  
She looked up.  
  
Looking at the glass, she saw her lover on the other side.  
  
Her lover was a beautiful woman who had blue eyes, smooth skin, and short silver hair.  
  
Her lover looked up and unseeing made eye contact with her dark brown dilated eyes.  
  
The light was covered immediately. The building shook from a door slamming and suddenly she had to get out of her dance cube. Her lover had escaped into the night. Hurting herself more than once as she hopped from the stage, found the door, scooted down the hallway and jerked the outside door open, she only saw a glimpse of a red lotus with almost black tinted windows.  
  
Sighing deeply, she leaned back against the building, hoping that the lights would come on soon and she could clock out. Her body wondered if she could find the bookkeeper’s office in the darkness, but her brain knew that wouldn’t be the right medicine anymore. And the wrong medicine could make you sick.  
  
When the power did come on, she walked in the hallway past her viewing room. At first, she hadn’t realized what she had done or why, but when she caught the smell of perfume and saw a lipstick on the floor, she knew she had been hoping for a sign of her lover. ‘A woman,’ she thought with a smile as she clutched the lipstick in her palm. ‘Sweet. That makes it so much better.’ She breathed deep trying to memorize the woman’s scent.  
  
*** *** ***  
  
“Look at me.” She whispered three fingers deep and shaking the dawn into day. Blue was revealed behind fluttering eyelids. Staring into them she could believe the hands stroking her skin were those of her mystery lover. Not looking away she thrust her fingers over and over again. Touching the real sex of the woman below her, she made love to the image in her mind.  
  
Collapsing against the redhead’s heated body, she was enveloped in a loving embrace.  
  
Nights and days went by rolling into weeks. Their sex imbued with this phantom love created a strange bubble around them. The red head said more and more in the seconds where she held back a word or two.   
  
Work became an endless parade of short timers unable to withstand the intensity of her gaze.  
  
Perhaps the fire was dimming in her red head? Her arms wrapped tightly around her one morning and a single tear slid down between their cheeks. It was becoming real for her. That day she went downstairs to her own apartment thankful for the hours of daylight that separated them.  
  
*** *** ***  
  
Short timers left a lot of time for breaks. She went outside more often to hear the crickets playing their songs. She wondered if she should consider a different job. She’d make less money and probably work harder, but maybe it was time for a change. To what though? She didn’t have an answer no matter how long she stood outside listening for the crickets. More than once she walked down the hall to the bookkeeper’s office and more than once she turned around, knowing the bridge was burned and she couldn’t rebuild it. She wondered if she had burned the bridges to any way out of here.   
  
Bartender.  
  
She would hit her head back against the wall in frustration. So many girls when they grew out of performing went out to tend the bar. Not everyone could coach the new girls. Too many cooks spoiled the fire or something like that. Besides she didn’t want to coach more girls. If she made a break then she wanted out completely.   
  
Tending bar was out of her cube, but only as far as the front room.  
  
She just couldn’t do it. It wasn’t far enough away, just like California wasn’t far enough away from Ohio.   
  
After graduation she made her way out west, cliché though it might have been. She wouldn’t have thought her father had noticed except that he grabbed her by the arm in the hall with her duffel bag in hand.  
  
There was nothing to rebuild between them—no broken lines of communication or trampled on family ties. Their lives had been twisted so completely that they didn’t recognize each other, didn’t want to.  
  
A bus ticket and a drunken dream.  
  
What was a girl to do?  
  
Sex as distraction. Sex as manipulation. Sex as power.  
  
She had learned to play hard and to use her assets. Putting on a show had come natural to a party girl pushing away reality and replacing it with beaches, fantasies, and playing fast and loose. This job had seemed designed for her and a lot safer than other things she could have ended up doing. Hey, it was even legal.  
  
The only future couldn’t be bartending. She refused to allow it. Until she could think of something else, she’d stay right here even if she was bored of the short timers. Sighing heavily and letting her chest rise and fall gave her some satisfaction. It showed she still had control of some part of her world. Turning on her heel determined to find a better future for herself, she would return to her stage.  
  
*** *** ***  
  
“What do you need, baby?” Her blue eyes were honest and intent.  
  
The word sent a chill down her spine like the first Santa Ana wind whipping across the state. She shivered under the weight of the care in her lover’s eyes—those blue eyes so different than the ones she might never see again. She shoved that thought out of her mind and pressed forward.  
  
“Nathaniel can’t fix my car anymore.” The blue eyes flashed green with jealousy, but it was hidden in an instant. The woman could throw walls up quicker than the screen could go down at work. It was fascinating to see her rise from the bed in the morning, shower, and then transform into a fashion harpy. The passion gone, the huskiness in her voice washed away, and her skin fresh and cold, she would step up onto her Jimmy Choos and begin a song and dance on her cell phone that resembled a lion tamer on her chair. Sighing at the jealousy that she didn’t have time for, she continued on. “He’s going to see if Doug can do the job, but that’s going to cost me.”  
  
Dusting nonexistent lint from her Calvin Klein dress, the red head fought a smug smile. Stepping back to the bed, she crossed her arms and lifted her nose in a superior manner. Clearly, she was puffing up her chest to show that she was the better bird. “Come with me today. Simone’s going to be out.”  
  
Being on display was something that she did every night, but this felt like putting on someone’s skin and parading about in it. The runway, the open air, the clothes and shoes all felt like taking something that was dirty and private and trying to clean it up and make it fit for the masses. She wondered if that was how Halloween felt every year in its purified form. The men and women at the show looking at her (or the clothes) were no different than the men and women that looked at her from the other side of the glass. Money was exchanging hands whether it was for clothes or the model in the clothes. At the end of the event, she would have money in her pocket.  
  
Backstage with her small purse full of cash, she pulled the vixen into the back room. “I liked you on the stage.” Her lover pressed her back into a rack of clothes. “Do you like having everyone’s eyes on you?” Buttons were coming undone in rapid succession as she kept talking about watching her body move. “I want you to model for me.” Buttons were forgotten as the skirt was pulled up instead. Her breasts half spilled out of her bra and a pink tongue teased against the pert nipples. The red head was on her knees as her hands pulled down thin panties. “So natural on the runway.” Then her fingers were sending shivers through the dancer’s body and she lost herself in taste and touch. Above her, hands reached backward onto the rack and breaths were sucked in, trapping screams.  
  
Tottering on high heels that didn’t belong to her and in a fresh outfit, she left the red head to deal with the aftermath. A nap was in her future before she could return to her honest job. The illusion of the fashion show was just that an illusion. At least at night people paid for a sexy show because that’s what they wanted. Fashion as far as she could tell was about the illusion of culture and art, when all that was really wanted was for the model to strip off those garments and let the fun begin.  
  
For the first night in weeks the screen stayed up.  
  
Her heart thrummed in her chest, but she forced herself to slow down. She would make the most of her time with her phantom. Every minute would be about reconnection and pulling back in.  
  
The phantom had been seen, and was still wanted. Keeping her eyes on the window, she let her eyes show only acceptance and desire—the darkness behind the glass had been illuminated, the woman had been older, breathtaking. Her absence indicated fear of rejection or perhaps acceptance.  
  
At the end of the night, she sat on the end of the stage looking at her lover. Not touching herself or dancing, but sitting as if in quiet contemplation, as if their relationship had become comfortable and easy in its quiet spaces and silence.  
  
Reaching to the side of the stage, she picked up the lipstick. Slipping the tube out, she looked with wide eyes over the lipstick to the glass. Pouting her lips out, she smeared the red across her lower lip in two strokes and then the upper lip in one. She sucked them in pressing them together and then blew a kiss to the glass. She put the lipstick in her palm and stood closer to the glass than she ever had before. She fought the urge to press her palm against it and she was sure that the silver beauty on the other side noticed. Instead, she nodded once and then turned toward the back corner of the room where she would either climb the stage again if the screen stayed up or open the door if the screen closed.  
  
Looking back with large, sad brown eyes she saw the screen was shut.  
  
Her phantom had left once more without saying goodbye.  
  
*** *** ***  
  
“You’re amazing.” The red head pressed her against the car as soon as she stepped out of the club. Her hands were everywhere. It was as if she was possessed. It was too close to work though for that kind of contact. She pinned her hands and kissed her hard.  
  
Pulling away and getting in the passenger side she laughed, “Guess you came in this time.”  
  
Scrambling to keep up, her lover quickly slipped into the car and slammed the door shut. “Why didn’t I come in last time?” She asked turning the ignition and nearly flooring it out of the parking space.  
  
Elbow on the door of the car, she mussed her bangs over her sunglasses. The morning was always surprisingly bright. She didn’t answer.  
  
Two red lights later, she asked quietly, “How much money does Doug want?”  
  
Sighing she considered not answering. Knowing it was rude she muttered, “Too much.”  
  
Blindly she reached for her phone and grimaced as she looked at the text. Letting it drop back into her bag between them she offered quietly. “She fired Simone. You could take her place today, or…”  
  
Suddenly sitting forward she looked her lover over from head to toe. “Or what?”  
  
Feeling once again like there was no winning or losing, the red head looked ahead forcing herself to concentrate on the road. “You could take her place. Regular gigs. We could…” A car cut in front of her from a driveway and she slammed the breaks. “Dammit.”  
  
Prideful, feeling sorry for herself, and generally miserable she said nothing as the car eased forward once again.  
  
“Your job is really hot. Amazing. It’s just—” the normally-talk-a-mile-a-minute woman paused again. “It’s just, as a model, I could see you more. Our relationship could grow.”  
  
*** *** ***  
  
The bed had become as comfortable as her own. The steps to the bathroom had become sure and steady. The layout of the apartment was the flip of her own, but it was something else settling down on her shoulders, something familiar and… stifling. No, no, no, it was comfortable, nice even. She felt her hand clenching on the comforter and flipped her legs out and began the process of donning her clothes. Her red head was still in the shower, when she slipped out into the early light of the morning.   
  
Sitting back up against the headboard, she didn’t even take her clothes off. The glass of water cradled in her hands sloshed slightly as she sat. “A day job. A life.” Letting out her breath in a puff, she continued, “There’d be no picket fence with red, but it could be nice.” Taking a small sip that barely seemed worth the effort, she held the glass to her lips. A day job meant no screen to come up and stay up. It meant no lover that she longed for with that inexplicable and insatiable hunger. The blue of these eyes was not the same. With no contact, her lover was even more of an untraceable ghost than before. Setting the glass on the bedside table, she slouched down on the covers. The image of the retreating lotus loomed behind her drooping eyes. “How can I catch the wind?”  
  
The thud of her shoes hitting the floor echoed slightly in the empty apartment. “Walk the runway. Do it on the catwalk.” She mumbled to herself and she balled up the pillow next to her. “Maybe I could do some crazy shit like Lohan and make it rich. I could time it right…” In her dream, the lotus stopped for her at the edge of the parking lot and when she caught up to it the driver beckoned to her with those blue eyes. The dream world let her be worthy of her lover.  
  
She woke tired and lonely. The day had nearly done itself in and she was hungry. Forcing herself to focus on the bowl of cereal, she tried to think herself into a headspace for work. It wouldn’t do to not be at her best tonight if the screen stayed up.  
  
*** *** ***  
  
Something to prove, an animalistic tendency to renew, a straw to grasp at became slow, sensual. Coming no longer the goal, control no longer a concern, the urgency succumbed to the tenderness of a gentle hand. Sliding their sexes together from above, red reveled in the play of their bodies together. Heart rates slowed down to the same gentle rhythm as the twin pulses between their legs. Strong arms wrapped around her holding on to what was known in life, grasping at the only clarity she could find. Their kisses deepened and red slid to the side still holding her lover. Fingers gently scored the skin on their way down and then sent a shiver up the spine as they slid home. Brown eyes opened wide, meeting soulful sapphire orbs. They each trembled as she flexed her fingers—both promising and asking. On the flow of the moment her lover kept eye contact as her own trembling hand found its way to her lover’s center.  
  
Kissing when they felt the urge to close their eyes, they rocked back and forth into each other building a slow climax together. Their breathing hitched. Glances were stolen from behind eyelids heavy with desire. They filled each other to over flowing on the crescendo of their passion.  
  
Laying in the intensity of the moment the dancer longed for the protection of her screen.  
  
She turned on her side to get a drink of water and rest. Red would need to get up soon, but not yet.  
  
The red LED lights of the alarm clock gave her something to focus on. She needed something mindless to distract her from what they had just shared. The warmth on her back, lips against her shoulder and a gentle claiming hand on her stomach let her know that there would be no real distraction. Closing her eyes against the silent tears, she lay her head down on the pillow. The warmth against her back slowly eased and red’s breathing revealed a steady morning slumber. The brunette sighed as she blinked away another wave of tears.  
  
‘It’s all changing.’  
  
*** *** ***  
  
The screen went up, but her heart wasn’t in it. The air around her was still cold at the beginning of the night and she knew that her lover had never come in this early. Her mind stopped at the phrase. Her body halted its movement awkwardly forcing her to change stances as if she hadn’t followed her routine correctly. She tried not to shake her head, but the thoughts wouldn’t leave her alone. Robotic movements and faraway eyes made her look like a novice dancer even though this had been her bread and butter for a few years now. The screen went down and she hung her head in relief but did not go outside to seek fresh air. The cleaner would look around in the room for a few minutes, if necessary and then another customer would be shown in.  
  
Her breathing was loud in the small room. She had not even allowed herself the comfort of a heavy bass beat this evening. Too many high-profile thoughts that she needed to work through were swirling in her brain. Her lover was real and that was the worst part. She knew that the silver haired woman was out there somewhere, but with nothing other than the lipstick and a desire to see her dancer there was no way to find her.  
  
Could she let that stop her from having a life with red? Should she?  
  
She didn’t always want to be a dancer that much was certain, but she hadn’t planned on giving it up so early. Never would she have thought that modeling would have been the next career. ‘Fashion,’ she half snorted to herself. ‘I seem to prefer a lack of fashion,’ she thought as she looked down at her attire.  
  
The screen came up and she moved more fluidly this time, but it didn’t matter. The short timer on the other side didn’t care what she did as long as it didn’t include picking her nose. The screen closed again and she was left in the silence of her thoughts.  
  
‘Our relationship could grow.’ The words echoed in her mind as the screen went up once more.   
  
Anger at the world flowed through her. She was tired of wanting things that were out of reach or getting things that she thought she wanted only to find that they weren’t so bright and shiny as she thought. The customers here probably often thought the same thing and if they knew what really went on behind the glass, they probably wouldn’t come here at all. Selling sex but fueled by anger or frustration or thoughts of something else entirely not about them and not about sex at all. If they only knew, but they didn’t. They saw what they wanted to see—a scantily clad woman getting even more scant of clothes and looking for all the world like she was sex on a platter just for them.  
  
She shook her hip out to the side and then half turned to the glass biting at her finger before tearing her teeth away in a ferocious growl that would never be heard. She stepped and turned her back to the glass. Stalking away she let her brassiere fall away. She stepped up onto her platform and half turned to look back at the glass with a snarl on her lips. She made a show of pulling and pinching at her nipples even though the customer could not see. Throwing her head back as if in ecstasy, she propped her leg up and let her hand fall between her legs. Stroking and arching her back in a wild display, she put on the show that she was there to do. Falling back on the cold stage took her breath away but she kept her hand busy stroking against her sex through the rough lace of her boy shorts. Her anger was about hiding things from view and forcing the customer to use their imagination. Scooting across her platform she let her arm come up to grip the edge above her head. With her other hand, she pulled at her nipple once again, letting the hoop of the nipple ring shine in the overhead lights. She twisted and turned it as she brought her other leg up. Then she trailed that hand down her body until it slid under the lace edge guarding her sex. Her fingertips played against her sex and she bit the inside of her stretched arm as she let her body shake with the image of climax.  
  
The screen went down.  
  
With a sigh she sat up and made her way around the small room to gather her brassiere and slip it back on. Then she went to the sound panel at the back of the room. The scratchy sounds of the disc began a slow build. She let her anger go as the beat washed over her. The haunting voice would perhaps not be anyone else’s choice for seduction music, but it had always flowed through her. Still standing at the back, she closed her eyes letting the song wash over her, its passionate voice expressing emotions she had been accumulating.  
  
Her hips began to slowly bounce from side to side of their own accord. She let them rotate and her shoulders went with it. Stretching had never been so slow and sultry. The muscles of her rib cage opposed her hips as she brought her left arm up, reaching first for the sky and then back behind her head as far as she could. Reaching up, her other arm held it in place as she bobbed her head with the lyrics. Then she widened her stance and let her body swing down over her legs side to side. Her fingertips would have brushed the floor, but she didn’t let them. Rising, she let her right arm come up to stretch this time. Crossing her arms across her chest, she lost herself in the music. The sweet stretch of her neck as it rolled back and forth let her begin to feel sexy. It was a slow warm up, though it was so worth it. She felt better as she punctuated the music with her shoulders each time to the side. The song came to an end and she looked over her shoulder at the glass. She could not tell how long the screen had been up. That it had stayed up while she was stretching gave her heart a pang of hope.  
  
Facing the back of the platform, she pulled her right leg up against her chest stretching down the back of her thigh. Her eyes gazing intently at the glass, she swung her knee wide before setting it back down to the ground. The next song started and her favorite voice filled her brain. Stretching her left leg the same way, she then extended it so that the heel of her shoe rested on the platform. Laying her body against her leg stretched it even further. Setting her foot down again, she turned so that her back was against the platform.  
  
**“I’m so tired of playing  
Playing with this bow and arrow”**  
  
She arched back against the hard, wooden edge and let her hands slide down her body to cup the lace covering her breasts. Letting her head swing back, she reached up again and pulled her hair loose. The tawny waves of hair made a quiet swish as they swept across the wood with her movements. In a fluid motion, she arched forward and then pushed herself up until she was sitting on the edge.  
  
**“Gonna give my heart away  
Leave it to the other girls to play”  
**  
Pointed toes, she pulled her legs up over her body crossing them as she swept her arms up over her head. The slight movement allowed her to let her legs fall just to the side of her. Rising up on all fours, she looked intently at the glass as she crawled forward. Fingertips just over the edge of the runway, she stopped and lowered her face down to the surface. Her ass in the air, she slowly pulled back letting her hands press hard against the lacquered wood.   
  
**“For I’ve been a temptress too long  
Just…”**  
  
The pointed heels of her shoes poked her ass and she settled between them. The burn in her knees was worth it. No one else would have left the screen up for this, no one but her lover. She let her body sway from the hips up as the singer continued to pour her heart out. Rubbing her cheek against her shoulder, she reached across her body to pull down the strap of her brassiere. Her fingers just dipped under the edge of the lace brushing against her already pert nipple. Her hips really ground down causing a sweet friction against her boy shorts. Looking at the glass again, she bit her lip as she pulled down the other strap.  
**  
“Give me a reason to love you  
Give me a reason to be a woman”**  
  
Hot hands that should have been her lover’s pressed against her cheeks before sliding down over her lips and down her neck. She pulled her arms wide tracing her collarbones before she let those fingertips slip into the lace and pull her breasts out. Her eyes closed as she sat kneeling and offering her breasts up to the glass. Her body still pulsed with the song.  
  
**“I just wanna be a woman…”**  
  
*** *** ***  
  
A huff accompanied the opening door when she arrived after her shift. The night had been long and all the longer for the emotional bareness she had let fill her time with the lover. She wasn’t sure if it was a full moon, or if she was trying to say goodbye, or simply accept that this was all that they would have. The glass and a lot of money and emotions down the drain.  
  
The photo shoot had apparently gone all kinds of wrong, keeping the fashionista at work later than she should have had to stay. “Models on boats, in a breeze. Brilliant.” Then she pulled her lover in for a grumpy morning kiss that had given way to love making that would more properly be called the Olympic sport of wrestling. The brunette was glad to channel her earlier frustrations and mask her emotional crossroads for at least another day.  
  
A call cut any possibility of cuddling out. The fashionista jumped up on a rampage. The highest heels in her arsenal had been pulled out and she snapped out orders on her cell phone before she even hopped into the shower. The brunette considered a shower, or getting dressed in more than her work clothes, but it seemed pointless to get dressed when she was just going to get dressed again and again at another fashion event. At this rate, she figured she could completely make over her car instead of just pay back the money that she had borrowed to get it running.  
  
Her eyes dropped shut for what felt like less than ten seconds.  
  
“What is this?”  
  
It took some effort, but she opened her eyes once more. This time she was looking sideways at her lover holding her jacket and a tube of lipstick in her other hand. She shook her head and swung her body up. She shrugged. “The lipstick?” She asked reaching for her clothes on the ground.  
  
The toe was tapping. This was bad. ‘How does someone even tap their toes in five-inch stilettos?’  
  
Throwing the jacket on the bed, the red head snapped, “Of course the lipstick. You don’t wear this shade.”  
  
Standing up into her boy shorts the brunette tilted her head in confusion. She reached out and the lipstick was dropped into her palm.  
  
“Whose is that?”  
  
Stepping into her over shorts, she muttered. “I don’t know.” It was the truth, but she knew it wouldn’t be a good enough answer.  
  
The silence answered for her. In this case, she was glad that red only screamed in bed.  
  
“Someone probably gave it to me to hold at the club and never got it back. You know how it is.”  
  
The cell phone called time-out just like a referee’s whistle. The big sigh was full of aggravation and disappointment. “Let’s go.” She turned on her heel and walked out. Slipping on her brassiere and her leather jacket quickly she followed. The car ride was silent. It was a good thing that the models were grouped and fussed over and not really given a break and that red could cool her heels while running around making sure that last minute details were taken care of.  
  
*** *** ***  
  
Trussed up in clothes that no one could possibly think of wearing in Venice Beach let alone Santa Monica or Beverly Hills, she prepared to step out onto the runway. Again, the open air was almost the most surprising thing about the show. She certainly didn’t mind being on display and this time she felt less of a faker. Maybe she could do the day job after all. Too bad she couldn’t explain the lipstick that red had found. “You’re next, hurry up.” The backstage assistant hissed at her. She found herself wondering if this was what red was doing a few years ago. Glaring at the woman, she couldn’t see that had been much of a promotion.  
  
Remembering videos of catwalks in Milan, she deliberately didn’t look at the crowd. That was a difference too for this job—the customers were in full view, if one wanted to look at them. She found that perhaps she didn’t want to. Looking was dangerous to her heart she had found even with the cloak of darkness and the three inches of plexiglass.  
  
At the end of the walkway a board was slightly uneven and she nearly stumbled. Looking down she walked back and forth on the end of the catwalk throwing her hip and her attitude miles away.  
  
It was then in the pregnant pause that she looked up.  
  
She very nearly fell over at the sight of large sunglasses, a pale face, a cerulean blue plunging neckline, and the most beautiful silver hair she could ever have imagined.  
  
She quickly made her way down the catwalk and into the outdoor dressing area.  
  
Fully expecting her lover to be absent each subsequent time she made her way uncertainly down the walk, she felt for all the tea in China that she was walking the gangplank on a pirate ship.  She prayed that, like in her dreams, Keira Knightley would save her or at least be stranded on the island with her.  
  
However, her mysterious lover was there front and center each and every time.  
  
It was a million times better than the jolt of electricity that shot through her when she realized that her lover was on the other side of the glass. The heat of the sun and the pulsing of her body threatened to ruin the clothes she was modeling and she now wanted to model more than anything else in the world. Especially if she could model for the beautiful silver haired one down the runway.  
  
*** *** ***  
  
Afterward she found herself in turmoil as she waited to be paid. She wanted to bolt out of the backstage area and find her lover before she escaped the scene. Part of her wanted to get paid and say goodbye to red, so that she didn’t get in more trouble with her. The last thing she wanted was a tearful farewell. Although a farewell seemed fairly certain at this point, if she could only have her way.  
  
Triumphantly entering the back-stage area, red made her way around the group of models giving them their envelopes and dismissals. When everyone else was cleared out she took her by the hand. “Nigel was even more impressed this time. He said you would be an acceptable replacement for Simone.”  
  
They stepped outside into the remaining bustle of the fashion event.  
  
“That’s. Um. That would be great.” She said giving the red head an awkward hug. It was not like her work self to hug people, let alone the models. She straightened up in her dancer’s hold but was released almost immediately. “And cash.” She said taking the envelope and tucking it into her waistband.  
  
Red started to say something, but found those brunette eyes focused somewhere behind her. She turned and gasped as her silver haired boss walked behind them talking to Nigel about the day. The lipstick suddenly made sense since it was a shade that she saw everyday of her life. She turned back to see the look of longing in her lover’s eyes that never had been there for her. The physical pain of the betrayal and loss shot through her like lightning. Her hand raised up as her arm pulled back ready to strike the unfaithful woman in front of her.  
  
Cold fingers on her wrist were followed by even colder words. “You’ll leave. That’s all.”  
  
Turning suddenly on her captor, she hissed with barely held back rage. Breathing hard, she looked from her boss to her former lover. If she could have smacked both their heads together she most certainly would have. However, this way she still had a job, even if she didn’t have a lover. Nigel had always told her that it took her personal life and her professional life blowing up to get that next promotion. She hoped her year working for the devil really would pay off and get her out of here.  
  
Reaching into a hidden pocket, she pulled out the tube of lipstick she had found that morning. “Unbelievable.” She muttered as she tossed it in the air and stalked off.  
  
*** *** ***  
  
Alone, in their own minds at least, they regarded each other. The cover of night, the protection of the glass, and the cloak of anonymity all gone they did not know what to say when at long last they had a chance to speak. Eyes traveled the length of each other’s bodies feasting silently on the bounty of the day’s gifts.  
  
“My assistant…” The silver haired beauty began.  
  
Smirking the brunette squared her shoulders, “Her boss…”  
  
A sad, knowing nod passed between them.  
  
Inhaling a deep breath, she knew it was time to claim her future with both hands or let it slip away. They couldn’t stand looking at each other forever.  
  
Two steps closed the gap between them. Brown eyes questioned though full, pink lips remained mute. A gentle hand cupped the smooth cheek in front of her and blue eyes fluttered shut. Smiling, the brunette trailed her thumb gently against the skin she had longed to feel for so long. The touch, an end in itself, proved that the ghost lover was real.  
  
Neither stepped away and when blue eyes opened again full of longing, all resistance was gone. She pulled her forward kissing her hard on the mouth.  
  
Pulling away they each breathlessly looked at the other uttering one phrase at the same time. “You’re real.”  
  
The car ride in a roomy black leather back seat was not the lotus she had seen once, but it was parked out front when the driver stopped. Hesitation and shyness were banished in the pureness of the moment. Their lives had each been separately moving them forward to this point and there was no going back for either of them. Hours spent in futile desire were caressed away as they lay together undressing, touching, and kissing each other. Separate questions in each of their lives were suddenly answered with the certainty of each other. To love again or not? To settle for less than magical or not? To make a life with the one they had been dreaming of silently became the truth for each.  
  
Much would need to be talked about, preferences in food, working hours, exes and assistants, children, and how it would all fit together. The simple passion of the moment gave them the confidence that all complications would be made easy, since apart, their lives had already been hard.  
**  
FIN.**

 

 

...


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